Tag Archives: mushrooms

Tapas-Style Sautéed Mushrooms

I’d been oggling Bev’s recipe for sautéed mushrooms on Tasty Kitchen for a while, and finally got around to making them for a big group of friends back in February. And oh are they good. They do have a long cooking time–about 50 minutes–but require very little supervision, so you can let them cook away while you focus on the main dish you’re preparing. And once they’re done–oh my. Soaked in sweet wine flavor, pungent with garlic, brightened by the parsley and lemon juice and slightly crunchy with coarse salt. This dish reminds me of my deep love of food, and the pleasure of cooking what I truly enjoy to the very roots of my taste buds.

I modified it to serve a larger group, and used sliced baby bella mushrooms instead of the whole mushrooms Bev used–I also increased the cook time to make sure all the wine was absorbed by the mushrooms. Here goes!

Ingredients

(Serves 6-8)

32 oz baby bella and white mushrooms, whole or sliced
6 TBS Butter
8 cloves garlic
3/4 cup Marsala wine
2 pinches coarse salt (kosher or sea salt)
2 cups minced fresh parsley
1 lemon, juiced

Mince the garlic and parsley, and juice the lemon.

Melt the butter in a large cast iron skillet over medium high heat. When bubbly, add the minced garlic and bloom for about 30 seconds.

Add the Marsala wine and bring it to a boil.

Add the mushrooms, lower the heat and cook (covered) for 25 minutes, stirring and lightly salting occasionally.

Uncover and continue to simmer the mushrooms for another 25 minutes, stirring occasionally and adding salt to taste until the liquid has been almost completely absorbed. I also tossed in a little black pepper–I can’t resist that stuff.

After a while the liquid will be nicely absorbed and the mushrooms will now be ready for you to fall in love with them.

Toss in the lemon juice and parsley, sprinkle with coarse salt, and serve.

If you already love mushrooms, I guarantee you will love this way of making them.

Next time I’m alone for dinner I dream of making a huge batch and eating the whole thing myself.

Just want everyone to know where I stand.

A fun serving idea–you could bring the cast iron to the table with a bunch of skewers or forks and have everyone share the mushrooms directly from the pan. That would be very español.

And can I just say? I’m so glad to be sharing recipes again after such a long pregnancy-induced hiatus. Aaaaahhh.

Click here for printer-friendly version: Tapas-Style Sautéed Mushrooms

 

The importance of a garnish

The importance of a garnish.

Is not to be underestimated.

Sometimes, I forget to have fresh herbs lying around. Then I cook something very brown, and attempt to photograph it.

And the results are sad.

Like this delicious mushroom that I blogged about yesterday:

It doesn’t look horrid–but can you imagine how much better it would look with a sprinkling of fresh thyme on top?

Let’s use the Photoshop clone stamp tool to move some peas on top. Just pretend they’re herbs.

If you kind of squint your eyes you can get the idea. C’mon–squint up–see the difference?

And this slow cooker teriyaki chicken (side note–not a blog-worthy recipe when all was said and done). It’s a yellow-brown pile of whatsit.

 But if I had remembered the green onions . . .

Food photographers, take note: garnish, garnish, garnish.

Let’s take a positive example in which I remembered the benefit of a tiny leafy green spot: Chicken Parmesan.

Can you imagine how this would have looked without the basil?

Like a pool of white drowning inside a pool of red. The garnish adds dimension, color, contrast, interest. A focal point for the eye to engage what would otherwise be a blob of food. Here–I’ll Photoshop away the garnish so that you can see the difference:

Haruzziah.

And while we’re using the clone stamp tool, do you mind if I give myself a third eye on my forehead, implant a string of pearls down my nose, and put my eyebrows on my upper lip?

Wow. Très debonair, n’est-ce pas?